70 Percent of People Are Able to Hear This Silent Gif And the Internet Is Freaking Out

December 5, 2017

If you get on the internet often, it’s very likely that you have seen a gif. If you haven’t, they are silent, animated images, however, recently, many people have reported that they can actually hear this silent gif. In turn, the internet is asking why.

This gif is odd all by itself but what makes it even odder is that people are claiming that they can hear it. Yes, while it is making no sound people are still saying they can ‘hear it.’

The gif was created by Twitter user IamHappyToast and is not as unbelievable as you might think. Dr. Lisa Debruine, a researcher at the University of Glasgow put together a poll on her Twitter account to see just how many people were ‘hearing’ this gif. So far most agree that they can hear a thudding sound.

Well, to help make things a little clear it is not just this one specific gif that people have this reaction with. Our perception of sound can be influenced by visual information in many ways. Our brain is merely being tricked into hearing the thud noise since we are seeing something that is portrayed as heavy hit the ground. A study carried out earlier this year found that 22 percent of people who participated could hear faint sounds when they were shown a flash of light all the while no sound actually occurred. It really is all in our heads to an extent.

The shaking effect only adds to this illusion and as explained in the Tweets below is not as crazy as it sounds:

When the visuals presented to you impose a cognitive load greater than what your brain can handle, your brain tends to stop processing it objectively and replaces it with stereotypes/previous experience. This image forces your brain to associate it with the stereotype image 1/2

of skipping rope. The mind associates the image with the steel lattice towers “skipping rope” with the electrical lines being “the rope”. This also makes your mind link the image with other effects associated with the stereotype. Hence, you can “hear” the “jumps”. 2/2

Look into Correlated neuronal activity. The brain is “expecting/predicting” what is coming visually and then fires a version of what it expects across the relevant senses. Also explains why some might “feel” a physical shake https://t.co/erpiCiv5hX

Isn’t that neat? Because our mind associates the shaking motion and the fact that something is falling with a thudding noise it makes us hear that noise in our minds. Separating sound from sight might not be as simple as you would think.